7/12/07

Green zone green light
Salah Hemeid
… Reliable Iraqi sources say that US military bases already constructed, or under construction, are large enough to accommodate some 100,000 American soldiers if the US command decides to keep them in Iraq. Sources say that the bases, mostly expansions of bases of the former Iraqi army, are buffered by broad swathes of land, fortified with heavy weaponry and remote-controlled electronic devices. The primary function of these bases will be to suppress internal opposition to the Iraqi government, but US air strength and special forces in these bases will also have rapid deployment capabilities for reaching points outside Iraq at need….
www.uruknet.de/?p=38986

Sadr Militia Moves To Clean House
Ned Parker, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
….The local U.S. commander, Lt. Col. Patrick Frank, has praised the Mahdi Army’s moderate elements for seeking stability in the Jihad neighborhood. Last month, a gang that no longer answered to Sadr marched through Jihad brandishing heavy machine guns and rocket launchers, so the Sadr office sent a delegation to ask them to drop their weapons, but they refused. “So the good Mahdi Army started chasing them. They arrested four of the bad Mahdi Army and turned them over to the Iraqi army with their weapons,” said Jihad’s local council chief, Malhan Abu Jalal. “Now everybody believes that there is no benefit from fighting and they should support the political process. There is cooperation between the Sadr office, Iraqi forces and U.S. forces”…
www.uruknet.de/?p=38996

Iraq Ambassador: Iran Aided the Surge
Newsmax
Iraq’s United Nations Ambassador Hamid al-Bayati admits that help from Iran played a key role in calming insurgent activity in and around Baghdad. “Yes, they have been helpful. It has been a combination of the American surge and Iranian cooperation that has led to a decrease in attacks,” explained al-Bayati in an exclusive interview with Newsmax….
www.uruknet.de/?p=38977

Occupation forces steal Anbar’s reconstruction Funds
Roads to Iraq
…Members of Anbar governing council expressed their concern yesterday saying that the American forces are stealing Anbar’s reconstruction funds, and write false reports to their supervisors about several progress and reconstruction projects in Anbar. Anonymous source said that most of these reports are false and success-stories fabrication, do not exist on the ground, these projects mentioned are only on papers. Another source said that he read the financial report submitted by the occupation forces reconstruction Committee and found it full of lies…
www.uruknet.de/?p=38976

The surge is a sideshow. Only total US pullout can succeed
Jonathan Steele, Guardian
…A few weeks earlier I spoke to one of the spiritual fathers of the Sunni insurgency, Sheikh Harith al-Dhari, now in exile in Amman. The head of the Association of Muslim Scholars, he argued that the Awakening movement only represented a small proportion of Sunni tribal leaders. “The situation in Anbar is very bad, and many are out of work and impoverished. Some will work with anyone who pays them, whether it is al-Qaida or the US army. I agree the attacks on US forces in Anbar have gone down, but in a few months they may go up again. The US is building its hopes on a small trend. It doesn’t follow it will continue,” he said. His remarks chimed with a poll conducted in mid-August for the BBC and ABC news. It found Anbar was still the strongest bastion of hostile anti-US opinion in Iraq…
www.uruknet.de/?p=38983

Saddam’s top aide escapes Iraqi security raid
Sify, India
Iraq’s former vice-president Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, a top aide of executed president Saddam Hussein, escaped an overnight raid on him in Salahudin province, a senior provincial official said on Friday. Al-Douri, who figures on the US’ list of 55 most wanted Saddam officials, escaped an overnight raid on his hideout in a village east of Tikrit city, about 170 km north of Baghdad, the official said…
www.uruknet.de/?p=38982

Support Grows for Baqa’a Camp
Hussein Al-alak, Welcome to Baqa’a Refugee Camp
We are pleased to inform you that Welcome to Baqa’a Refugee Camp, has been given further public support with the following letter which was posted on The Cowley Street Bedouins website earlier this week. “Whilst surfing the net I came across a site. The site ‘Welcome to Baqa’a Refugee Camp’ is a collection of blogs from Palestinians. It makes for interesting reading….
www.uruknet.de/?p=38968

Analysis: Big Oil to sign Iraq deals soon
BEN LANDO, UPI Energy Editor
Big Oil’s big dreams are close to coming true as Iraq’s Oil Ministry prepares deals for the country’s largest oil fields with terms that aren’t necessarily what companies were hoping for but considered a foot in the door of the world’s most promising oil sector. Iraq’s proven oil reserves are only smaller than those in Saudi Arabia and Iran — and the country is only about 30 percent explored. Iraq produces about 2.4 million barrels per day, a recent increase from the 2 million bpd post-invasion average, but far below what its reserves could handle….
www.uruknet.de/?p=38965

Iraq: A New Country?
Must Watch  5 Minute Video
A video that describes what the situation is really like in Iraq.
www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18852.htm

Woman suicide attacker and car bomb kill 26:
A woman wearing a vest packed with explosives killed 16 people and a suicide car bomb killed 10 in Iraq on Friday, in attacks aimed at units helping U.S. forces fight al Qaeda.
www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L07543380.htm
 
Iraq: Another 11 killed as US occupation grinds on:
Five bodies were found in different districts of Baghdad on Thursday, police said.
www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L07657637.htm
 
Marine charged with murder in Fallujah killing:
Nelson’s squad leader, Jose Luis Nazario, also faces criminal charges in the case, one in a series of incidents in which members of the U.S. armed forces are accused of committing violent crimes in Iraq and intensified criticism over the U.S. invasion.
abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=3970340
 
Shi’ite rival to Iraq’s al-Sadr slammed for US visit:
An imam with ties to Shi’ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Friday criticized a rival leader’s recent visit to Washington, calling it an act of “surrender.”
snipurl.com/1uxsk
 
Cowards:
Democrats signal compromise on Iraq funding:
Democrats controlling Congress sent the most explicit signals yet on Thursday that they are resigned to providing additional funding for the war in Iraq before Congress adjourns for the year.
www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22146002/
 
Majority of military families disapprove of Bush’s handling of Iraq war :
A majority of military families disapprove of President George W. Bush’s handling of the war in Iraq, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found.
snipurl.com/1uxsm
 
Military Families Question Iraq War as Support for Bush Slips:
``Saddam Hussein wasn’t a threat and the culmination of my career was that war and it wasn’t necessary,’’ says Fletcher, 32, a financial analyst in Bluffton, South Carolina, who served almost 10 years as an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps.
snipurl.com/1uxsp
 
‘Millions missing’ from Iraq fund :
A $5.2bn (£2.6bn) fund used to train and equip Iraqi security forces cannot be shown to have been used properly, US military auditors say in a new report
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7132310.stm

Kathy Kelly | Traveling Light
www.truthout.org/docs_2006/120707S.shtml
Kathy Kelly writes for Truthout about her discussions with Iraqi refugees in Amman, Jordan. She describes the nonviolence training that a group of Iraqis are participating in and their plans for a peaceful public demonstration of nonviolent determination in Iraq, where political action can be horribly dangerous.

Annapolis & “The Surge”: Spinning a Legacy
Dr. Bernard Weiner
…Indeed, from the CheneyBush perspective, an Iraq-in-perpetual-chaos serves the neo-con cause. It means that the U.S. will remain, perhaps for decades, the big kahuna in that country and region, with time and freedom to help develop and control the huge untapped reserves of oil there, and to use Iraq as the central command center for U.S. military/political machinations throughout the Greater Middle East…
www.uruknet.de/?p=38972

Specialist doctors a vanishing breed in Iraq
Aseel Kami, Reuters
Ear, nose and throat specialist Abu Samir laments that he has only one colleague left to call after an exodus that has robbed Iraq of about 70 percent of its most qualified doctors. “My phone book became empty. Out of 50 numbers, I find one name left from the specialists I know,” said the 66-year-old, who asked not to give his full name. Specialist doctors have fled Baghdad and other cities in scores since the 2003 invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, with most going abroad or to the relative safety of Kurdistan in the north. Once the elite of Baghdad society, medical specialists quickly became a target for insurgents, militias and kidnappers in search of rich ransoms…
www.uruknet.de/?p=38969

Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Thursday, 6 December 2007
Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board, the Free Arab Voice. www.freearabvoice.org
…In a dispatch posted at 10:56am Baghdad time Thursday morning, the Association of Muslim Scholars of Iraq (AMSI) reported that US troops killed three Iraqi civilians southeast of al-Kut, 150km southeast of Baghdad on Wednesday night. The AMSI reported that US forces staged an airborne landing in the al-Hayy area and carried out operations there for three hours, searching for “wanted men.” The Americans arrested a number of local residents during the operations….
www.uruknet.de/?p=38974

Green zone green light
Salah Hemeid
… Reliable Iraqi sources say that US military bases already constructed, or under construction, are large enough to accommodate some 100,000 American soldiers if the US command decides to keep them in Iraq. Sources say that the bases, mostly expansions of bases of the former Iraqi army, are buffered by broad swathes of land, fortified with heavy weaponry and remote-controlled electronic devices. The primary function of these bases will be to suppress internal opposition to the Iraqi government, but US air strength and special forces in these bases will also have rapid deployment capabilities for reaching points outside Iraq at need….
www.uruknet.de/?p=38986

Iraq must cut food rations in 2008-trade minister
Reuters
Iraq will have to cut food rations in 2008 because of insufficient funds, Trade Minister Abdul Falah al-Sudany said. His ministry had asked the government for more than $7 billion in next year’s budget to distribute 10 basic items but received only $3 billion. “This means that … five items (will be distributed): Sugar, flour, rice, milk and (cooking) oil,” Sudany said in a statement issued on Wednesday. Sudany said his ministry would continue to distribute its stockpiles of other items such as lentils, chickpeas and soap, but would be unable to buy more…
www.uruknet.de/?p=38966

Analysis: Big Oil to sign Iraq deals soon
BEN LANDO, UPI Energy Editor
Big Oil’s big dreams are close to coming true as Iraq’s Oil Ministry prepares deals for the country’s largest oil fields with terms that aren’t necessarily what companies were hoping for but considered a foot in the door of the world’s most promising oil sector. Iraq’s proven oil reserves are only smaller than those in Saudi Arabia and Iran — and the country is only about 30 percent explored. Iraq produces about 2.4 million barrels per day, a recent increase from the 2 million bpd post-invasion average, but far below what its reserves could handle….
www.uruknet.de/?p=38965

BAGHDAD’S REFUGEES
Trapped in the Green Zone
Ulrike Putz, SpiegelOnLine
The Al Jaafs are one of hundreds of Iraqi families that have sought refuge in Baghdad’s so-called Green Zone in recent years. The international enclave, home to the headquarters of the Americans and their allies, is a city within a city; Nestled in a bend in the Tigris, the quarter belonged to the elite under Saddam Hussein. This is where the dicatator’s palaces stood and stilll stand, off limits to ordinary mortals. Entry to the zone remains restricted today. Behind its high walls, tens of thousands of soldiers, diplomats, foreign workers and Iraqis live in relative safety. For the Al Jaafs, it’s become safety on demand. Since the Iraqi government took over management of the zone, it has been trying to drive Iraqi families away. “They want us to move back into the city,” says the father of the Al Jaaf family. The 52-year-old is certain that he and his family wouldn’t survive a single day on the outside. “Anyone who has worked for the Americans is considered a traitor and is as good as dead,” he says…
www.uruknet.de/?p=38981

Iraq lawmakers end any hope of reconciliation in ‘07
Associated Press
Iraqi legislators suspended parliamentary sessions for the rest of the month on Thursday because of an upcoming religious season. The decision spelled the end of much-delayed efforts to pass U.S.-backed legislation aimed at achieving national reconciliation this year. The U.S. defense secretary, meanwhile, welcomed the news that violence in Iraq has declined 60% in the last six months but warned that “people are getting impatient” for the Iraqi government to take advantage of improved security and move toward needed political reforms….
www.uruknet.de/?p=38961

Pentagon Cites Poor Controls for Iraq Fund
www.truthout.org/docs_2006/120707C.shtml
The Associated Press reports, “A Pentagon audit of a $5.2 billion fund used to train and equip Iraqi security forces found that United States commanders used sloppy accounting and could not always show that equipment, services and construction were delivered properly, according to a report released Thursday.” And Alec Klein, of The Washington Post, writes, “A $200 billion plan to remake the largest war machine in history unfolds in one small way on a quiet country road in the Chihuahuan Desert.”

Jonathan Steele | Only Total US Pullout Can Succeed
www.truthout.org/docs_2006/120707H.shtml
From The Guardian UK, Jonathan Steele writes: “If the gladdest tidings of this pre-Christmas season have been the US intelligence community’s brilliant move to undermine a Bush attack on Iran by revealing there is no Iranian nuclear weapons programme, the worst news concerns US policy on Iraq. And it is not just the US announcement of plans to get the Iraqi government to agree to permanent US military bases and an open-ended occupation, thereby confirming what most analysts had long assumed was the Republicans’ intention.”

Justices to Weigh Court Access for Americans Imprisoned in Iraq by U.S. Military 07 Dec 2007 The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to consider whether federal judges can hear arguments from American citizens who are being held in Iraq by the U.S. military for alleged crimes there. The justices today said they will review the cases of Shawqi Ahmad Omar, who was captured during a raid that targeted a former al-Qaeda [al-CIAduh] leader, and Mohammad Munaf, who is facing execution for taking part in a kidnapping plot. Both men are seeking to avoid being turned over to Iraqi authorities.
www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=
newsarchive&sid=aUK1bLKkOUIw

State Dept. retains manager of troubled embassy project 06 Dec 2007 A State Department project manager banished from Iraq by the U.S. ambassador and under scrutiny by the Justice Department continues to oversee the construction of the much-delayed new American embassy in Baghdad from nearby Kuwait, State Department officials disclosed Thursday. James L. Golden, a contract employee, is still managing the $740 million project, said Undersecretary of State Patrick Kennedy, the department’s top management official.
www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/22700.html

Violence surges in Iraq as 25 are killed in 2 attacks in Diyala 07 Dec 2007 Twenty-five people were killed Friday in the tumultuous Iraqi province of Diyala, northeast of Baghdad, in two separate attacks. Fifteen people were killed and 20 wounded when a suicide attacker detonated a bomb in the town of Muqdadiya near the headquarters of a local committee of former insurgents working with U.S. forces [?!?]. It was not clear whether the bomber was a man or a woman because two heads were found alongside shredded bodies near the bombing site, according to a police official from the town. [I am thinking that ‘insurgents’ and ‘U.S. forces’ are – and have always been – one and the same.]
www.iht.com/articles/2007/12/07/africa/iraq.php

Military Families Question Iraq War as Support for Bush Slips 07 Dec 2007 Kent Fletcher, an Iraq war veteran, says he enthusiastically voted for President [sic] George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004. Now, he is a registered Democrat who questions the need for the war, the way it has been managed and the treatment of returning veterans
www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid
=newsarchive&sid=a9eBP4ZM28G8

Baghdad may be safer, but few Iraqis in Syria risk returning (no …
[div class=excerpt][b]Baghdad may be safer, but few Iraqis in Syria risk returning [/b] By Hannah Allam | McClatchy Newspapers DAMASCUS, Syria — On a recent chilly afternoon, Bahija Jawad, an Iraqi grandmother living here, …
www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/d
uboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x3093505

Rot here or die there
New Statesman – London,England,UK
In the past two weeks the Iraqi government has highlighted the return of
thousands of Iraqi refugees from Syria. The government says that these
returns are …
www.newstatesman.com/200712070001

Iraqi Refugees in Lebanon Face Crisis
Human Rights Watch on Tuesday published 66-page report, “Rot Here or Die There: Bleak Choices for Iraqi Refugees in Lebanon.” The report “documents the Lebanese government’s failure to provide a legal status for Iraqi refugees in …
middleeastprogress.org/2007/12/iraqi
-refugees-in-lebanon-face-crisis/

22 Killed in 2 Suicide Attacks in Iraq
The Associated Press –
The attacks highlighted the dangers for the US-backed groups, which often include former insurgents who have turned against al-Qaida in Iraq. …
ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gkx-3oY
eFwuWKCusr2jrojs98w8wD8TCL0G80

Suicide Bomber Kills 15 in Iraq
New York Times – United States
Diyala is ethnically mixed and continues to be wracked by violence even as attack rates throughout Iraq have dipped. The violence has been exacerbated as …
www.nytimes.com/2007/12/08/world/middleeast/08iraq.html?hp

UN refugee agency warns against Iraq returns
AFP –
Earlier this week, the un’s special representative in Iraq Staffan de Mistura said the UNHCR was contributing three experts and 11 million dollars to a …
afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5g3KnHAidfvIwphY5pDCkMvaZ6JbQ

‘Millions missing’ from Iraq fund
BBC News – UK
The report said the Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq was unable to provide “reasonable assurance” that money was not wasted and that the …
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7132310.stm

58 Percent of Military Families Want Troops Home Within a Year
www.truthout.org/docs_2006/120707M.shtml
Faye Fiore reports for The Los Angeles Times, “Families with ties to the military, long a reliable source of support for wartime presidents, disapprove of President Bush and his handling of the war in Iraq, with a majority concluding the invasion was not worth it, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found.”

State Department Retains Manager of Troubled Embassy Project
www.truthout.org/docs_2006/120707N.shtml
Warren P. Strobel reports for McClatchy Newspapers, “A State Department project manager banished from Iraq by the US ambassador and under scrutiny by the Justice Department continues to oversee the construction of the much-delayed new American embassy in Baghdad from nearby Kuwait, State Department officials disclosed Thursday.”

US Plans to Form Job Corps for Iraqi Security Volunteers
www.truthout.org/docs_2006/120707O.shtml
Karen DeYoung and Amit R. Paley report for The Washington Post, “The US military plans to establish a civilian jobs corps to absorb tens of thousands of mostly Sunni security volunteers whom Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government has balked at hiring into local police forces.”

FNC’s O’Reilly Highlights MRC Study: As Iraq Improves, Coverage Falls
By NB Staff
FNC’s Bill O’Reilly on Thursday night centered his “Talking Points Memo” around the findings in the MRC’s Media Reality Check study released earlier this week, “Good News = Less News on Iraq War: As Surge Succeeds and Casualty Rates …
newsbusters.org/blogs/nb-staff/2007/12/07/fncs-oreill
y-highlights-mrc-study-iraq-improves-coverage-falls

Poll: Military Families Disapprove Of Iraq War, Want Troops …
By Eric Kleefeld
Among those families with troops in Iraq or Afghanistan, 60% say the war in Iraq was not worth the cost, the same number as the general population. And even worse for the administration, 27% of those same respondents said the troops …
tpmelectioncentral.com/2007/12/poll_military_families_
disapprove_of_iraq_war_want_troops_brought_home.php

Gates Leaves Iraq Encouraged
New York Times – United States
6 — Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Thursday that security progress in Iraq was significant yet still fragile, an assessment echoed by the senior …
www.nytimes.com/2007/12/07/world/
middleeast/07gates.html?ref=middleeast

Female suicide bomber kills 16 in Iraq
Reuters Canada – Toronto,Ontario,Canada
By Alaa Shahine BAGHDAD (Reuters) – A female suicide bomber wearing a vest packed with explosives killed 16 people in Iraq on Friday in an attack on former …
ca.today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNew
s&storyID=2007-12-07T101818Z_01_L0577346_RTRIDST_0_
NEWS-IRAQ-BOMB-COL.XML&archived=False

US toll in Iraq
San Francisco Chronicle – CA, USA
As of Thursday, at least 3886 members of the US military had died in Iraq since the beginning of the war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press …
www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=
/c/a/2007/12/07/MNGI5TQ5PC.DTL

Metro Briefing | New Jersey Waldwick: Soldier Killed in Iraq
New York Times – United States
By AP An Army sergeant from Bergen County was one of three soldiers who died in Iraq after their vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb, the Pentagon announced …
www.nytimes.com/2007/12/07/nyregion
/07mbrfs-SOLDIER.html?ref=nyregion

Pentagon Cites Poor Controls for Iraq Fund
New York Times – United States
The report, by the Defense Department’s Office of Inspector General, said the command in charge, known as the Multinational Security Transition Command-Iraq …
www.nytimes.com/2007/12/07/w
orld/middleeast/07audit.html?ref=world

Iraqis ‘left to rot’ in Lebanon
By FarhadA
A human rights watchdog has sharply criticised Lebanon’s attitude to Iraqi refugees who do not have valid visas. About 50000 Iraqis are thought to have fled violence and instability in Iraq to the relative safety of Lebanon. …
www.buzzflash.net/story.php?id=33207

iraq, torture
By Sex And Politics and Screeds and Attitude(Sex And Politics and Screeds and Attitude)
The man had deployed to Iraq and Burden says, “he told me that him and his buddies had applied for conscientious objector before and been ignored.” Last month, a traffic violation led to his being stopped and then place in jail for two …
sexandpoliticsandscreedsandattitude.
blogspot.com/2007/12/iraq-torture.html

Houston to Dubai: A Nonstop Flow of Money
Village Voice – New York,NY,USA
While you’re financing the trillion-dollar Iraq debacle, the execs at Halliburton got some good news today from the United Arab Emirates: The uae’s airline, …
blogs.villagevoice.com/bushbeat/archi
ves/2007/12/houston_to_duba.php

US names 7 Iraqis backing insurgency from Syria
Reuters – USA
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Treasury Department on Thursday put seven people it said were backing the Iraqi insurgency from Syria on a list that forbids US …
www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSN0658693120071206

Looks like a trend in Iraq
By podcasts@redstate.com (Redstate Network)
There are clearer signs that Iraq is becoming less violent, perhaps sustainably so. Civilian casualties are one measure for gauging the success or failure of a counterinsurgency operation, and they have dropped for the third consecutive …
www.redstate.com/stories/archived/looks_like_a_trend_in_iraq

News & Views 12/06/07
By dancewater(Cervantes)
Photo: Immigrants, carrying no travel documents, who said they were from Iraq and had sailed from Lebanon , sit on the beach of Kato Zakros on the Greek island of Crete , Thursday, Dec. 6, 2007. Coast guard officers transported 193 …
warnewstoday.blogspot.com/2007/12/news-views-120607.html

Max Bergmann: NSN Iraq Daily Update 12/06/07
By Max Bergmann(webmaster@huffingtonpost.com)
New agreement on contractors in Iraq will give the military notice of all operations. Ambassador Ryan Crocker and Gen. David Petraeus, the top US commander in Iraq, agreed to a new memorandum of understanding on private security …
www.huffingtonpost.com/max-bergmann
/nsn-iraq-daily-update-12_b_75611.html

Gates: Iraq’s Govt Under Pressure to Achieve Political Reconciliation
SecDef Gates says there is growing pressure for the top levels of govt to replicate the political reconciliation occurring in parts of the country.
www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/news
/iraq/2007/12/iraq-071206-voa01.htm

Cheney Predicts Iraq Will Be Self-Governing By 2009
By Gateway Pundit(Gateway Pundit)
Vice President Cheney today predicted Iraq will be a self-governing democracy by the time he leaves office, calling the current US surge strategy “a remarkable success story” that will be studied for years to come. …
gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2007/12/
cheney-predicts-iraq-will-be-self.html

Analysis: Big Oil to sign Iraq deals soon
by Ben Lando
Washington (UPI) Dec 6, 2007
Big Oil’s big dreams are close to coming true as Iraq’s Oil Ministry prepares deals for the country’s largest oil fields with terms that aren’t necessarily what companies were hoping for but considered a foot in the door of the world’s most promising oil sector.
www.energy-daily.com/reports/Analysis_
Big_Oil_to_sign_Iraq_deals_soon_999.html

Polish president at odds with new PM on Iraq: Tusk
by Staff Writers
Warsaw (AFP) Dec 5, 2007
Poland’s new liberal prime minister, Donald Tusk, admitted Wednesday to holding divergent views from conservative President Lech Kaczynski on Iraq and the proposed US missile defence shield.
www.spacewar.com/reports/Polish_president_
at_odds_with_new_PM_on_Iraq_Tusk_999.html

Al-Qaeda moving to Iraq’s north
The Times – Johannesburg,Gauteng,South Africa
The former head of the group, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was slain in a US air strike in the province last year. To counter them the US military began last month …
www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=652175

FLASHBACK: Investigators says billions of dollars wasted in Iraq …
By Signs of the Times(Signs of the Times)
About $10 billion has been squandered by the US government on Iraq reconstruction aid because of contractor overcharges and unsupported expenses, and federal investigators warned Thursday that significantly more taxpayer money is at …
www.sott.net/articles/show/144947-Investigators-says-billions
-of-dollars-wasted-in-Iraq-Nearly-3-billion-by-Cheney
-s-Halliburton-alone

Budget Battle Hinges on Iraq
The Associated Press –
The Iraq funding would ultimately be attached by Bush’s Senate GOP allies to a $500 billion-plus “omnibus” appropriations bill taking shape in closed-door …
ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gixk7z
ImDdX6OCLyosj4cYB9c7gQD8TC9F300

Car bombs kill 23 in Iraq during Gates visit
Reuters – USA
Despite the day’s bloodshed, overall attacks across Iraq have fallen to their lowest level in nearly two years, focusing attention on whether the …
www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSYAT566796

US agencies tighten Iraq contractor, security rules
Reuters – USA
The two US agencies with key responsibility in Iraq sought a “common understanding of how and when force, and particularly deadly force, should be used by …
www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN05643714

A Look at War-Related Violence in Iraq
The Associated Press –
David Petraeus, the top US commander in Iraq, cited a 60 percent decline in violence in the country over the past six months. A look at US military deaths …
ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5j7D-xqh6
pWcyYIj_U8wVG3fIv-CgD8TC8U4G0

Gates: Marines will stay put in Iraq, for now
Christian Science Monitor – Boston,MA,USA
As security improves in Iraq, a move to send more American troops back to Afghanistan could be grist for Democrats in an election year, analysts say. …
www.csmonitor.com/2007/1207/p03s02-usmi.html

ICRC visits detainees held by Iraq government
Reuters – USA
“We hope to be able to visit more places across Iraq,” she added. The ICRC requires governments to allow its officials to interview detainees in private. …
www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSL06912739

Heading back home to Iraq
BBC News – UK
Nabil carefully unpicks the tape sticking the flag of his beloved Iraq to the wall, neatly folds it, kisses it and then puts it into his case. …
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7131848.stm

Iraq: Villagers Protest al-Qaida Attacks
The Associated Press –
BAGHDAD (AP) — Shiite villagers paraded empty coffins at mock funerals near Baghdad on Thursday, demonstrating against alleged al-Qaida in Iraq attacks that …
ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gkx-3oYeF
wuWKCusr2jrojs98w8wD8TC12300

Nine killed in attack on Iraq checkpoint-police
Reuters – USA
BAGHDAD, Dec 6 (Reuters) – Nine policemen were killed in an attack by suspected al Qaeda gunmen on a checkpoint outside a town in Iraq’s volatile Diyala …
www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSL06388124

Iraq must cut food rations in 2008-trade minister
Reuters – USA
BAGHDAD, Dec 6 (Reuters) – Iraq will have to cut food rations in 2008 because of insufficient funds, Trade Minister Abdul Falah al-Sudany said. …
www.reuters.com/article/africaCrisis/idUSL06528476

Iraqis in Mousil see rise in violence
By Iraqi Mojo(Iraqi Mojo)
The former head of the group, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was slain in a US air strike in the province last year. To counter them the US military began last month Operation Iron Hammer which encompasses not just Diyala, but also Salaheddin, …
iraqimojo.blogspot.com/2007/12/iraqis-in-
mousil-see-rise-in-violence.html